WHITESMOKE IV Ð APRIL 24-25, 2000

Please note: Name spellings are wrong, research was not done, scores are not provided, and I have forgotten some teams that were present. Also, this is nearly wholly a vanity piece as I am writing about my former team and my hometown all in one. That being said, here you have WHITE SMOKE IV. April 24-25.

Trivia you need to know: The Notre Dame men's team is called Papal Rage. Their discs and T-shirts sport Popes laying out for discs or otherwise engaged in Ultimate activities. This is probably related to the fact that Notre Dame is a prestigious Catholic University.

White Smoke: When it comes time for the Catholic Church to draw straws for the new Pope, the living embodiment of The Holy Ghost on earth, they will seclude themselves in Vatican vestries, pantries, and reliquaries until someone lights a fire to burn the infidels out of hiding. When an infidel or two is burned, dark smoke rises from the Vatican's smokestacks and everyone sighs, not again. The straws are redistributed, and the Cardinals and Arch-bishops go into hiding once more. The fires are started again to chase out those sequestered in the wine cellar until finally, when the conflagration fails to engulf an unholy member of the congregation, a pure, white smoke will rise into the air signaling to the world the election of a new Old Man in Charge.

*****

"You know, this is a pretty cool place to party." I don't recall having heard that said about my hometown in the 18 years I spent there, but this was a special occasion. South Bend, Indiana may be duller than most, just slightly ahead of Fort Wayne, but at least on Saturday night after the fourth annual White Smoke tournament held at the University of Notre Dame there was a decent 5 keg party held at an off-campus house with a bonfire in the back yard.

It's been five years since I've played competitive Ultimate at my alma mater. At that time the entire city had one struggling Notre Dame co-ed team and twenty or so local players, the remnants of a 12-team league that had apparently existed in the late 70's. South Bend routinely played the chump in Indiana, a state with a historical tradition of highly competitive intrastate Ultimate. But since those dim day South Bend has found a way to breed, and now, 12 years since I first starting playing, the city is filled with Ultimate love and success.

Notre Dame has led the charge. From humble beginnings a program of great wealth has emerged, fulfilling destiny with legions of spirit-filled Ultimate players defining a different way of life against a backdrop of the University's mostly conservative, white-collar-job-seeking student body. In 1997 Notre Dame Ultimate became the thing on campus as hundreds of students seized the chance to join a club intent of having good clean fun rather than one designed to bolster grades or worship television. In a scant seven years since being founded by some iconoclastic writer-type, a woman's team sprouted, a men's B-team formed, and eventually a woman's B team. The club sought and was granted club status by the university, and now enjoys the privilege of having tournament trips paid in full.

You could say that the success of Ultimate at a place like Notre Dame means that Ultimate in general is creeping towards mainstream acceptance, that a hard work ethic and the rigid rules of sport culture are becoming the norm rather than the exception. It may be true that this is happening around the country Ð but you will find no better a counter-example than the kids who pursue spirit, happiness and Ultimate at Notre Dame. These guys and girls are as joyful, excitable, laissez-faire and modest as a gaggle of Quakers at a kickin barn dance.

While the majority of college Ultimate teams across the country turn to Gaia uniforms, crew cuts, and rabid team fanaticism, the N.D. men's team is always captained by a shaggy, camouflage-wearing throwback. In fact, it almost seems a requirement to have long unkempt hair to play on the A-team at Notre Dame. The incoming freshmen and sophomores are relegated to the B-team until they have a chance to add a few more inches around the ears.

But don't call them hippies or stoners Ð they are neither. Ultimate has become a weird sort of hybrid creature, mutating from its once 50/50 base of nerds and stoners into a melange of athletes, fun-lovers, outcasts, engineers, geeks, and random individual types. And that's what you'll get at Notre Dame. Ultimate isn't about referees, statistics, and sports culture. Here at N.D. it's all about having a whole lot of fun.

*****

Top seed Michigan lost this tournament last year to Dayton. They were not going to lose it again. I think they wanted it badly and they were the only team here that was juiced for every game and every point, to the annoyance of some of those laid-back types who aren't in to spiked discs, showmanship, and on-field celebrations after every score. Michigan's rah-rah sideline cheering, pre-game chant "What do we do? We do our job! What is our job? To win!" or words to that effect and the mass of 22 backwards-ballcap, shiny-gold-uniform-wearing players was out of place at Notre Dame's mellowed-out tournament, home of the throwback. In fact, most of the men's teams in attendance - Ohio State, Winona State, Purdue, Indiana, Notre Dame A & B, Dayton, Notre Dame Alumni, Illinois, and a club mix of South Bend and Purdue Alumni, were of the old midwestern variety of chill play on and off the field. The midwest is home to many of the non-Xrules players and clubs and most were at the fields this weekend.

But Michigan has been making inroads on the National stage, and their style both reflects the caliber and attitude of that level of play, and helps to keep MagnUM focused on playing as well as they can. In many ways, they are following the success of Carleton, the Midwestern Machine that has dominated the region for so long.

So to no one's real surprise, Michigan won nearly every game handily, and then squeaked one out in the finals against the South Bend locals (who had even welcomed ringer Rich Hollingsworth, former Z captain and Indiana University graduate to play a few points on Saturday). South Bend had a strong combination of veterans and pickups, ranging from local heroes E-man and Mark Veldman to a few stars from the old Purdue guard, and even former IU captain and all-around no-nonsense sax-playing dood Big Bad Ben Barbera. But it was just not quite enough to overtake a well-conditioned, unfearing throng of Michiganders, led by another local hero Tim Murray (from nearby Niles, Michigan) and Phil Broring (prob. butchered that name) plus a healthy dozen or so prime-time tuned athletes. Murray mixed it up, going long and handling instead of just keeping back behind the disc.

In the woman's final, N.D. co-captain Kate McGreevy could only express a big "d'oh!" when seventh seeded Purdue (out of eight - the teams being seeded by Notre Dame) upset the home team in the finals with a two-point victory. To be fair, Notre Dame withstood some key injuries over the weekend, losing co-captain Carilu and force Adrianna to injuries in Saturday play. Purdue's tight-knit ten or so seemed in a helluva groove, having played well all weekend and ousting a strong Illinois squad in the semifinals. Notre Dame had beaten a tough Michigan team before the finals loss.

In Men's semis, Michigan waxed Illinois 15-5 or thereabouts and South Bend beatdown Winona State, perhaps 15-7. In quarters, things looked differently. Winona State had to play Notre Dame, which had emerged 3-0 in Saturday pool play after beating back the Papal Age alumni team and nipping Dayton 14-12. Dayton had the misfortune of facing yet another South bend team, the local clubbers, on Sunday morning and lost, making them 0-3 against Notre Dame/South Bend. The curse was clearly placed on them.

Winona, seeded second, had lost two tough games on Saturday, each by a point or two, and were thus a strong quarterfinal opponent for N.D. Winona jumped out early to a 9-3 lead and cruised in for the win, despite the presence of N.D.'s Callahan candidate Mike Shiel, an Ultimate monster that needs to get more discs thrown his way. On the adjacent field, invigorated by the home fields and status as the team founder, I took to acting every bit the captain of the many-captained Alumni team, cursing plays, calling defenses, and whipping my hat off and smashing it to the ground in disgust.

These antics may have been amusing to some but they had little effect on the game. We played extremely well, a stunning turnaround from the pure crap we had been playing on Saturday. Crisp throws and shockingly good defense from a bunch of used-to-play-regularly's. Hell, myself hadn't played a tournament since last year's summer league. Pretty poor, eh?

We took half against a solid Illinois team 8-6. The game was slow-moving and I knew a time cap would be at hand. Illinois regrouped at half and converted a series of turnovers into two scores to even the match. Then, in my humble opinion, we blew it. An upwind chance to score had been brought to us after 10 minutes of sloppy play on both sides. We were within 10 yards of going up 9-8 in what was comparably late in the game, but instead threw the disc away in the endzone and Illinois scored, then scored another and it was 10-8 them when the cap went on. Dagnabbit!

Well, we tried. The Agers (the Notre Dame team calls itself Papal Rage, thus the Papal Age for the alumni) came right back to 10-9, then 11-9, then 11-10 and then 11 all, game to 12. We had it, oh we had it! Our defense was suffocating Illinois and the turnovers kept coming. They were trying to give us the game! Alas, we gave it right back, and none more grievous than....well I'll get to that. So we have the chance to score upwind and win the game and we handled it up the field 15 passes, a nice flow, and then a bobble and a drop! Illinois can't score. We send one long to our 6'8'' receiver, guarded by a 6'6'' Illinois monster and they both go up and the disc won't stick in his hand! Illinois still can't score and we get the disc 8 yards from the endzone. Or rather, I, in a fit of pique, take a return trip to my former glory as captain and scoring machine. I, the once-proud leader who accounted for 80% of the team's points, either thrown or received. I had wanted to do it again so badly, To finish the game and rightfully soak up the glory that had once been mine!

So I picked up the turnover. On the left sideline, 8 yards from victory. I cocked a forehand and waited, waited, patiently. Those long arms of mine, right? I saw my cut, didn't need to fake, right? Ah fundamentals. I saw my cut, a short inside out forehand right up the line. Inside-out forehand to the short corner? Was I insane? Sure I had thrown dozens of those for scores in college, but c'mon. No one outside the midwest even bothers to use an inside-out forehand. They look great, but far too risky. So here was my glory and I cocked it and cranked it and slam! Hand-blocked! how humiliating! From the glory to the goat. From greatness on the goalline to a desperate sprint down the field to try and make a recovery, a last-minute bid at a block, a lunging poach D, a foot block, a phantom block, a flying tackle - anything! But it was too late. Illinois was juiced to get one back on me for an alleged reporting slight and they scored and the game was over.

Our Hero Leonardo just wasn't to be. Best to save the sport's mythology for those who deserve it...like Lizzy Shiel and Kerry O'Brien, or the rest of the team who had played their hearts out. Well, whatever. We laughed afterwards, shook hands gracefully with the opponent, circled up and thanked each other for some fun playing and quality Ultimate, even though we blew it. We woulda lost to Michigan in the semifinals anyway, and heck, it was supposed to be some sort of college-like tournament.

Shout-outs for running the tournament must go to Kevin Walsh, and David Pickett, and Patrick McCorry who stabilized the kegs in a roommate's 1964 Chevy Carriola (a beautfiul California cruiser - the prototype SUV, made to fit your surfboards) and paid the man who brought a pig roast to the fields for Saturday lunch. Yes, a whole goddamn hog, roasted and braised and cooked inside a thousand-degree portable fire pit that looked like a bomb squad's detonation tank. Also props to Gravy McGreevey for having the party Saturday night and Carilu and the Shiels for the food on Friday. A fun time was had by all, I believe. Good competition, good friends, good fun. Look for White Smoke V next year and sign up early.

P.S. Those rumors of kegs on the fields are totally inaccurate and false. Kegs on the fields for a college tournament? Heck - the nation's premier college tournament, Easterns, didn't even have a party! That's pretty lame. Apparently college kids just don't party like they used to in certain Southern parts of the country.

This was written for White Smoke, and published in the UPA Newsletter.

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